Odes to Alpharetta · Track 14 · middle
Avalon: Plaza of the Third Place
Avalon — the mixed-use development that opened 2014 and became the modern Alpharetta civic center: the open-air plaza, the holiday tree lighting, the fountains, the way it deliberately invented a "downtown" feeling for a 21st-century suburb. The Ray Anderson Center for Sustainable Business. The Saturday-night crowd at Whiskey Bird. The "third place" thesis made real. Sisukiro at the fountain.
Lyrics
[Intro] They drew you on a screen first. A place for us to be, after work. Before we go home. [Verse 1] They planned the width of the walk. Twenty-two feet. So we'd have to see each other. Couldn't help but brush shoulders. October 2014. You were just poured concrete and hopeful saplings. They called you a 'mixed-use development.' But you feel like a new lung. A place to breathe in public. [Chorus] And this is the third place. Not the desk, not the front door key. This plaza of the future, built today. The sound of water over stone, the sound of a name called across the green. They built a heart, and we came to make it beat. We came to make it beat. [Verse 2] I remember the first tree lighting. Cold hands around a paper cup. The smell of kettle corn and the gas heaters at Whiskey Bird. The Teslas charging in their silent rows. I think about the crew from Lawrenceville who set these pavers. Whose Spanish filled the air before our English did. They're not in the press release from North American Properties. But their hands are on every stone I walk on. [Chorus] And this is the third place. Not the desk, not the front door key. This plaza of the future, built today. The sound of water over stone, the sound of a name called across the green. They built a heart, and we came to make it beat. We came to make it beat. [Bridge] Ray Anderson knew about sustainability. Making something that lasts. Can you build a sustainable memory? Engineer a place for a first kiss, a Saturday morning coffee, a quiet argument? It feels like you can. It feels like they did. This deliberate town square. [Outro] The fountain mists my face. The light is going now. Someone's daughter is chasing the last of the pigeons. And I feel... third-placed. Here. Home, for an hour.